Making money from your creative abilities is a dream for many people around the globe. Graphic design sprouts into so many branches of specific arts and offers a broad spectrum of career possibilities. Thankfully, in the modern-day, a career from home is just an opportunity away. So long as you have the dedication and attention required to maintain the energy, you can work from home as well. So how do you become a graphic designer working from home?
In fact, there are less than 10 steps to becoming a work-from-home graphic designer.
- Establish your design career is a reality.
- Choose your desired focus.
- Gather what you need.
- Search for work! Freelance is a great start.
- Gain experience and learn your strengths.
- Don’t become discouraged by different expectations.
Everyone has the potential to succeed; it depends on the amount of passion you are willing to put in.
How to Become a Graphic Designer Working from Home
While having a list of steps to follow is great, there is a lot of information that is being left out. It leaves the questions of “how do I capitalize on each of these steps?” Let’s explore.
Decide Your Reality
Following your dream is one of the most challenging aspects of life by far. If you have always dreamed of working in the graphic design profession, it’s hard to know when the best time is to set out on your journey. If you really want to get started, though, you have to allow yourself to take that jump.
It is easy to dream but significantly harder to commit to those dreams. The moment you consciously put your foot down and assign the goal to yourself, that is when your journey begins. Commit to your dream as a career.
Choose Your Preferred Design Focus
When you consider graphic design, you may need to take a good look at your options. “Graphic design” is an umbrella term for quite a few things. Each job is unique in its own sense and presents its own expectations. It may be tempting to offer all the services you are skilled in, but if you haven’t utilized your skill as a trade before, choose one to start. You don’t want to burn yourself out on the things you love.
Digital Illustration
There are many skilled artists out there who don’t know their true value. While in the past, finding creative-oriented jobs may have seemed next to impossible, it’s different today. Thanks to modern technology, you can take your unique skills and creative style and offer them to thousands easily.
“Simple” visual creations are needed on a daily for businesses, both new and old. While many may brush them off, digital illustration is essential for companies.
- Logo designing
- Merchandise designing
- Content designing
These are just a few of the situations in which a business may need a digital illustrator.
Presentation Production and Maintenance
If you are someone with skills in website production and maintenance, or if you are someone skilled with social media, there is work for you to search for as well. Companies have teams of designers who work with the website interface and layout and teams who manage the social media aspect of their companies.
- Website Design and Interface
- Social Media Content Management
The presentation of their social media accounts, as well as their overall website, are extremely important. This effects the way the public interacts with their company and if it not an easy experience, it reduces the likelihood of having returning customers.
Video Production and Maintenance
Seeing the video packages crafted to hype big events is created to be energizing. Whether the video package succeeds or fails depends on the skill of the graphic designer who put the package together. Think about it: Would half of the movies or TV shows you watch be as good if the editing job wasn’t perfect?
While you may not be working for big movies at first, companies or individuals are looking for similar work to be done.
- Video editing
- Video production
- Video animation
If you are someone who likes watching cinematic films or even YouTube videos from higher-end creators, you will know how important it is to have the perfect edits.
Gather What You Need
Thankfully, if you are proficient in these skills, this may mean that you have the equipment and materials you need to begin and become a graphic designer working from home. If not, there are different requirements for each job you may take.
Digital Illustration
If you focus on digital illustration, you need to gather the fundamental components of composing art digitally. While there are certainly more tools you can use, these are the vital components.
Graphic Tablet & Pen: When choosing a graphic tablet, it will ultimately be up to you. There are great programs available on most tablets for art, meaning iPads can be used if you don’t want a tablet for just graphic design.
Digital Design Software: It is commonly recommended to install Vector graphic design software. Vector graphic programs allow for resizing the provided image without losing the quality of the artwork itself. This makes it easy for logo development, a single file being enough for whatever you may need. Adobe Illustrator is a popular choice.
Presentation Production and Maintenance
When you want to build a career from the work you can do on a virtual level, it will be helpful to have the right tools along the way. With the right equipment, your job will get much more manageable.
Web Design Software: Depending on the branch of design you are going into, you could only need essential software like website creation programs, like Dreamweaver from Adobe or Wix. If you are going to work with the interface design, programs like Adobe XD or Sketch 3 are fantastic choices.
Social Media Content Software: Social media is a huge part of a company’s growth, keeping in contact with their customer base to keep them notified. Apps for this include Adobe Spark and Canva.
Video Production and Maintenance
Whether you can put together a masterpiece from different clips of footage or if you are great at fixing mistakes seamlessly in a video postproduction, you have a gift you can and should utilize. There are many grades of video software, offering varying amounts of tools and possibilities.
Video Editing Software: Whether you are creating video packages, editing seamlessly, or something else entirely, you will want to have excellent video production/editing software. Consider programs and applications such as Adobe Premiere Pro, iMovie from Apple, or Cyberlink PowerDirector.
Search for Work
There are two ways of finding work. You can go the traditional way of searching through job listings for full-time, part-time, and jobs that hire you as an employee. The downfall for this is a lot of places want people with degrees.
A lot of graphic designers working from home who don’t have a degree go through freelance. There are many sites and services to go through to find clients. Websites such as Upwork and FlexJobs are only two examples.
Gain Experience
While the jobs may not always be the most exciting at the start, any job you are comfortable taking can help establish yourself. It will take a moment, but find the number of projects you can handle and learn the routine that is best for you.
Don’t Get Discouraged
It is much easier to be negative and lose faith in yourself than it is to stay positive. This is sadly how the universe and its forces will keep you away from your goal. It is up to you to keep pushing forward despite the pushbacks. You are the person who dictates your success.
While you may want success to come fast and easy, that is not how the world works generally. Instead, prepare yourself to enjoy the ride and try to enjoy every step of the way of becoming a graphic designer working from home.
Conclusion
If you have a desire to work from home, why let it stay a dream? Take control of your future today and let your creativity flow. You are the person who is dictating your future, and there are thousands of people out there who are trying just like you. Don’t take them as competitors, but as teammates. We’re all in this together.
Build your business and become the person you have always wanted to be. If you’re not ready to go off on your own into this journey yet, we invite you to check out “How to Build a Work From Home Business.” It answers whatever questions you may still have! Best of luck on the journey to the rest of your life.
